Dauphin County man gets life sentence in murder of South Whitehall woman

DAUPHIN COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S, CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

DaJuan Porter, 31, of Dauphin County, will serve life in prison without parole under a plea bargain in the murder of a South Whitehall Township woman.

DaJuan Porter, 31, of Dauphin County, will serve life in prison without parole under a plea bargain in the murder of a South Whitehall Township woman. (DAUPHIN COUNTY DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S, CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

The man charged with murdering 87-year-old Joyce J. Roth of South Whitehall Township will serve life in prison without parole under a plea bargain reached Friday that spared him a possible death sentence.

DaJuan A. Porter, 31, pleaded no contest in Dauphin County Court to the first-degree murder of Roth, who was killed at her son's house outside Harrisburg, where she had gone to celebrate her great-grandson's graduation from high school.

Authorities said the June 10, 2013, slaying stemmed from Porter's desire to intimidate witnesses against him in sex-assault charges he was facing. Police said Roth was not his intended target, but was stabbed to death when he encountered her after breaking into the Derry Township home.

Later that morning, Porter set fire to the Lower Paxton Township home of a second sex-assault victim, police said.

Under Porter's plea agreement, he also did not contest charges of burglary and arson, the Dauphin County district attorney's office said in a news release.

By not contesting the three charges, Porter admitted that prosecutors could prove them beyond a reasonable doubt. For the purposes of sentencing, it is considered the same as a guilty plea.

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Porter, of Harrisburg, was slated to face trial this month, and authorities had planned to seek his execution, according to court records.

In his sex-assault allegations, Porter was accused of performing oral sex on sleeping or unconscious men. The status of those cases was unclear Saturday.

Neighbors in Roth's Brickyard Road, South Whitehall, neighborhood described her as a religious woman who was in good health and never raised her voice or used foul language.